The House of Commons 1793-94

The exact occasion in the House of Commons which the picture is intended to represent is uncertain, in the absence of explicit documentation, but it has previously been thought to be an amalgam of the two debates in February 1793 at the outbreak of war with France. The first took place on 1 February, on the King's Message for the Augmentation of the Forces, during which Pitt referred to the execution of Louis XVI on 21 January - 'that calamitous event, that dreadful outrage against every principle of religion, of justice, and of humanity ...’. The motion was seconded by Lord Beauchamp supported by John Anstruther and William Windham, and opposed by Lord Wycombe, Samuel Whitbread, Charles James Fox and Lord William Russell. In the second debate on 12 February, on the King's Message Respecting the Declaration of War with France, Pitt moved that 'His Majesty may rely on the firm and effectual support of the representation of a brave and loyal people in the prosecution of a just and necessary war'. The motion was seconded by Edward Powys supported by Dundas, Windham, Burke, Sheridan, Ryder and Grenville. Fox moved an amendment rejecting the words 'his most gracious message' but otherwise supported the motion (Parliamentary History, XXX, pp 270-397).There are several reasons for rejecting these two debates though they may have caused the original inspiration for Hickel's picture. Firstly the news of the execution of Louis XVI arrived in London on 25 January 1793. The whole country immediately went into mourning, Charles Grey (later Earl Grey and Prime Minister) being singular as the only MP not to wear mourning in the House of Commons (Diary of Joseph Farington, 6 June 1807). Hickel paints only two or three MPs in black; Pitt wears blue and most are in light suits and brightly coloured waistcoats. Secondly, the trees outside are in leaf and the sun is shining from the south-east, one MP actually shielding his eyes from the glare through the window - an unlikely need during the well-known fog and smoke of a February morning in Westminster; nor are there candles in the chandelier and side candlesticks. Thirdly there is the unmistakable presence of Canning on the back benches behind Pitt. Canning was elected for Newton, Isle of Wight, in July 1793 but did not take his seat in the House until January 1794. And in July Farington records breakfast with Admiral Gardner who 'sat yesterday to Hickel for the picture of the House of Commons - They think the Portrait like' (Diary of Joseph Farington, 23 July 1794). A terminus ad quem is provided by the aged and diminutive Welbore Ellis, a regular figure on the Treasury bench 'dressed in all points as if he had been going to a drawing-room at St James's'. He was created a peer (Lord Mendip) in August 1794.In fact it is unlikely that Hickel intended to represent any specific occasion. No doubt the idea was sparked off by the excitement of the February debates and the constitutional bastion provided by the English Parliament against the excesses of the French Revolution. He may have made clandestine notes at the time. He would certainly not have been allowed prolonged access to paint the Chamber of the House until the summer recess and, in any case, the actual process of painting the picture lasted for at least two years. Most of the portraits were painted in the summer of 1794 and the picture was not ready for exhibition until May 1795. The best we can say is that it represents a general view of the House of Commons in 1793-4.Karl Anton Hickel, brother of the better known Austrian Court painter Joseph Hickel, settled in Paris shortly before the Revolution and managed to gain the patronage of Marie-Antoinette whose portrait he painted. Appalled at conditions in France he fled to England in 1789 or 1790 where he found the country seething with discussion about democracy and even the abolition of the monarchy. The clash on these issues of the two major political figures, Pitt and Fox, impressed him enormously and he planned two large pictures of the House of Commons, one angled to the Government side with Pitt addressing the House, the other towards the Opposition with Fox speaking. Hickel had become well enough known in London to be able to take on this task. He had exhibited at the Society of Artists from 1791, and from 1792 at the Royal Academy where he gave his address as 113 Great Russell Street describing himself as 'Painter to the Emperor of Germany'. He was able to get sittings from many of the MPs and by the summer of 1794 the project was well under way.Canning records a useful piece of evidence in May:

Then I went to Mr Hickel, a German painter, to sit for my picture ... He came to me one day with recommendations from F. North, Burke, Windham, the Master of the Rolls, and God knows how many more members of Parliament that he named, and proceeded to inform me that his design was to paint a picture of the House of Commons, from which in due time was to be taken a print, of the size of that of the Death of Lord Chatham - which would be a most pleasing and interesting thing for the present age and for posterity - and that he was anxious to rank me among those distinguished members of the House, who had condescended &c. to give him the length, breadth and expression of their phyzzes. There was no resisting the attainment of immortality at so easy a rate, especially when he added that he took his likeness in half-an-hour and asked nothing for taking it. I went accordingly - sat my half-hour in the morning, and half-an-hour more for finishing as I returned from my morning walk to the Temple - and the business is done. He has taken 40 or 50 of all parties and complexion - Fox, Sheridan, Burke, Windham, Ryder, Mornington, &c &c. and is to have Pitt and a thousand others, as soon as the rising of Parliament gives them leisure to sit. The painting of course is a daub - but the likeness is most formidable and astonishing. It certainly will be an interesting print and I would advise you by all means to subscribe for it. Next winter will be time enough.(Canning's Journal 31 May 1794, kindly transcribed for me by Dr Roland Thorne from the Harewood MSS in Leeds Central Library.) Joseph Farington continues the story in July:

I called on Hickel in Russell St. - He has made a great many Portraits of Members of the House of Commons. There are to be two pictures. The Majority being conspicuous in one with Pitt speaking. - The Minority in the other with Fox speaking.Hickel was 4 days with Fox at St Anns Hill. - Burke insisted on being placed on the opposition side and of its being filled as before the late change of political sentiment.(Diary of Joseph Farington, 25 July 1794.) A year later the first picture was finished and on exhibition in the Haymarket, announced by The Times, May 1795:

The Exhibition is now open from 10 till 6, at No.28 Haymarket, of a Picture 15 feet wide 11 feet high representing the House of Commons, painted by Mr. A. Hickel, commenced in the year 1793, contains 96 Portraits as large as life, taken by favour from the Honourable Gentlemen themselves.Admittance one Shilling.Subscriptions are received at the Exhibition Room for a Print to be engraved from the above; size 30½ inches wide by 22 high. Proofs six guineas, Prints four guineas, half to be paid on subscribing and the remainder on delivery of the Prints. The following week The Times said that the picture was attracting 'not only general admiration but a numerous attendance of the most fashionable Nobility'. In June it was still 'delighting the eye of a discerning public', Hickel had rejected an offer to purchase it from 'a certain noble Earl', and Pitt had entered his name as a subscriber for the engraving - 'this, no doubt, will make the subscriptions fill even with more rapidity than ever' (The Times, 9 June 1795). In July it was still on exhibition, Hickel had produced a sketch the same size as the engraving, and the noble Earl was still trying unsuccessfully to buy the picture (ibid., 9 and 21 July). Perhaps he should have accepted. Thereafter we lose sight of it temporarily. Hickel left England in 1797 for Hamburg where he established a brief success as fashionable portrait painter but died suddenly in 1798. The picture was removed to Vienna, put up for sale in 1814, and eventually in 1816, bought by Francis I, Emperor of Austria, and hung in the Schloss Belvedere where it received a brief notice in Murray's Guide: 'here is a curious representation of the House of Commons in 1793, with portraits of Pitt and Fox' (Murray's Southern Germany, 1853, p 219).When in 1850 Sir George Hayter was trying to persuade the Government to buy his Reformed House of Commons (NPG 54) he remembered the picture well. In a letter to Lord John Russell he writes:

The Earl of Ellesmere and (I think) Mr Sydney Herbert, each complained to me that there should be a small picture in Prince Metternich's collection in Vienna representing a part of the House of Commons, with Pitt on his legs ... Lord Ellesmere said, that it was a disgrace to the country that it should not have been purchased by the Government. Hayter was referring to the sketch, now disappeared, for he continues:

... it is small, coarsely and freely painted, by some unknown hand and contained at the utmost 15 or 20 heads. It was exposed in a shop window in Bond St. about 1821, and Lord Dover did not think it sufficiently good or authentic to purchase ...(Letter from Hayter to Lord John Russell 6 March 1850, British Museum Add. MS 38080. f92.) Farington mentions two pictures. The Opposition companion with Fox speaking never got further than an oil sketch, probably because of the difficulty Hickel experienced in selling the original (NPG 745). The Opposition sketch later belonged to Major-General Sir Claud Alexander, MP for South Ayrshire, and was then known as Lord North's Ministry by Gainsborough. It later turned up at Tooth's Gallery in Bond Street and was given to Sir Henry (Chips) Channon by Lady Channon in 1938. It is now in a private collection London. It measures about 51 x 75 cm (20 x 30 in) and is freely painted without the meticulous attention to detail of NPG 745, clearly intended as a preliminary sketch. Fox is on his feet corpulent in blue coat, yellow waistcoat, dark brown breeches, grey stockings, black slippers, black hat in left hand. The Speaker wears no hat, Pitt (seated) takes notes with a quill pen, other MPs are unrecognisable, the chandeliers and candlesticks have been omitted, and there are slight differences in the fenestration. Very few MPs are in mourning.The actual process of acquiring the Hickel picture is documented in some detail in the NPG archive. Visitors to the Belvedere and readers of Murray's Handbook do not seem to have realised its historic significance and it was not until 1867, when Hickel's oil sketches for the portraits of Erskine and Canning were lent to the National Portraits Exhibition at South Kensington by Earl Grey and Lord Houghton, that inquiries began to be made. It was found under the entry for Hickel in Nagler's Künstler Lexicon that a larger picture was mentioned. Even then nothing happened until Edward Stanhope MP (nephew of Lord Stanhope, Chairman of the NPG) by means of a plea in Notes & Queries located it in the Imperial Collection in Vienna. It was finally pin-pointed in the Belvedere by Colonel Everard Primrose, Military Attaché in Vienna, who had large-scale photographs taken but assured the NPG that there was no hope of its release - 'the picture is not to be begged, borrowed or stolen, but is obviously of great interest to your Gallery ...' (letter from Primrose to Scharf 1 October 1884 in NPG archive). Scharf immediately alerted the Chairman, Lord Hardinge, who wrote to the Foreign Secretary who instructed Augustus Paget, British Ambassador in Vienna, to take cautious steps towards its acquisition. At first Paget met with a total rebuff during the course of a private interview with Count Ferdinand Trauttmansdorff, the Lord Chamberlain, who assured him the picture was only temporarily in store while the Belvedere was being renovated, but that in any case it was Imperial property and there could be no question of its release or even transfer on loan. Paget appreciated the delicacy of the negotiations and asked for a little more time in which to manoeuvre, proposing that it might be possible to approach the Emperor personally:

I think therefore the only thing to be done is to endeavour to have the existence of this picture (of which H.I.M. is probably ignorant) brought before the Emperor, representing that it has of course the greatest historical interest for the British nation, that under the supposition that it belonged to the Gallery & not to the Emperor himself; I had been desired to make overtures for its acquisition for the National Portrait Gallery, and then to leave the rest to H.I.M.'s spontaneous action.(Private letter from Sir Augustus Paget to Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice 23 March 1885 in NPG archive.) Paget's years of experience in the Diplomatic Service stood him in good stead and a few months later he was able to write again with the good news that the picture had arrived at the British Embassy. The matter had been achieved almost entirely by Lady Paget:

Yesterday morning I received a letter from Lady Paget saying that Count Trauttmansdorff had called upon her and stated that the Emperor having heard (he, Ct Tr. did not know from whom) that she took an interest in the said picture, and as H.I.M. wished to do something agreeable to her, H.M. desired to place the picture entirely at her disposal to do with as she pleased ... You will easily understand how glad we both are that a work of such immense historical interest to England should become the property of the National Portrait Gallery, and how peculiarly gratifying it is to me as well as to Lady Paget herself that the Emperor should have afforded her this signal mark of his gracious favor ... although the Emperor laid special stress on the picture being given to her personally, as H.M. is nevertheless fully aware of the ultimate destination of the picture.(Private letter from Paget to Fitzmaurice 9 June 1885 in NPG archive.) 'What a triumph,' wrote Edward Stanhope to Scharf. The transaction was enshrined in an official despatch from Vienna to the Foreign Office and in a letter from the Chairman of the Trustees to Lord Salisbury conveying their special thanks to Lady Paget. It was announced in the House of Commons in answer to a question from Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice on 14 July 1885 by the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs who ended his statement: 'I am sure, Sir, I may take upon myself to say that the whole nation feels grateful to His Imperial Majesty for his most gracious and generous gift' (The Times, 15 July 1885). The whole affair was recounted by Lady Paget, with becoming modesty, in her book, Embassies of other Days, 1923, p 387. She rehearses the delicacy of the mission and ends:

However when Augustus was away in England I thought I would have a try by myself; and I succeeded so well that one day the Grand Chamberlain came to me, all bows and smiles, and said that the Emperor had heard - he did not know from whom - that I took an interest in the picture, and he begged to present it to me. I was very much touched, and wrote the Emperor a letter of thanks ... Count Szechen, a great Court dignitary, said that he had never seen the Emperor more delighted than at being able to give me this pleasure. Unfortunately Hickel made no key for identifying the figures in the picture - or at least no key has come to light so far - even though the exhibition in the Haymarket Gallery excited considerable interest and subscriptions for the engraving were well under way. Several serious attempts have been made at identification since the picture's acquisition in 1885, especially by Scharf; Kingsley Adams and Mrs Isherwood Kay, but although Hickel is believed to have had sittings from most of his subjects and many are very well known indeed, the task has not been easy. Pitt's tax on hair powder was not enacted until 1795 and the uniform use of powder and closely shaven faces does not help. Out of 97 figures only 46 or 47 can be certainly identified and about another 40 are possibly identifiable. Of Pitt's close associates on the Treasury Front Bench, Ryder (Paymaster-General), Dundas (Home Secretary), Mornington (wearing Ribbon of KP), Jenkinson (India Board and later Lord Liverpool) and Welbore Ellis (later Lord Mendip) are distinctive and it is not difficult to add possibilities from the Lords of Treasury and Officers of State known to have served in 1793-4. On the back benches, Canning, Wilberforce and the two Hood brothers can easily be recognised. Canning in fact, who did not become an MP until July 1793 taking his seat the following January, has left a description of the seating near himself during his maiden speech on 31 January 1794:

... Lord Bayham who sat by me, Pitt and Dundas sat immediately below me, & next to them Ryder - & Jenkinson - Wallace stood a good way to my left hand, near the speaker's chair - Lord Hobart was immediately behind me, & Charles Ellis behind me, but a good way to the left.(Canning's Journal cit. Dorothy Marshall, The Rise of George Canning, 1938, p 55.) Some of Hickel's figures are unmistakable, many indeterminate, but in most cases he painted individual portraits, usually head and shoulders in an oval surround, signed and dated: K. Hickel p. 1793 or 1794. Canning described them as 'daubs'. The first two examples to come to light were the portraits of Erskine and Canning lent to the National Portrait Exhibition in 1867 and since them about 17 others have turned up, some identified by name, others simply labelled 'Unknown MP'. A few other MPs have been identified either from portraits by other artists or from engravings. The following list and key therefore are only temporary expedients and it is to be hoped that a more comprehensive picture can be built up in the future.The sitters marked with an asterisk [*] appear in the main Catalogue; key numbers are given on the right, followed by the Member's final title in the peerage, the constituency represented at the time, and government office where applicable. His political orientation is given in brackets, showing on which side of the House we might expect to find him.

The scene represents the interior of the House of Commons (St Stephen's Chapel, destroyed by fire 1834) looking eastwards towards Speaker Addington in the chair, Pitt addressing the House from the Government side, Fox, Sheridan and Erskine on the Opposition benches. 97 people are portrayed of whom about 48 can be certainly identified and a further 38 named by conjecture.

The artist; His Imperial Majesty the Emperor Franz of Austria and King of Hungary; presented by his grandson Franz Josef in June 1885 to Lady Paget, wife of HM Ambassador in Vienna, who immediately presented it to the NPG.

A line engraving by Thomas Cheesman (pupil of Bartolozzi) was projected in 1795 but never achieved.

This extended catalogue entry is from the out-of-print National Portrait Gallery collection catalogue: Richard Walker, Regency Portraits, National Portrait Gallery, 1985, and is as published then. For the most up-to-date details on individual Collection works, we recommend reading the information provided in the Search the Collection results on this website in parallel with this text.